Nordic Skiing/Biathlon Thread

[MustIski]

Shame that Lähteenmäki was sick during the earlier days of Tour. She could have definitely competed for a place at the podium if she would have been fit. Kyllönen is having a really good breaktrough season. Too bad that her skis weren't too good today.

 

[python]

<<snip>
The Norwegian skiis seemed not too bad. But Northug seemed totally out of it regarding glide. It could be he was so tired today that he couldn't even double poll to gain the usual speed. I'm thinking a combination of Northug having a real bad day, the Norwegian waxers not being in top shape, and Northug totally blundering when he chose the skis.

when analyzing elite race results, i often value post-race comments of the participants themselves above what my own eyes saw…it appears there were 2 reasons for petter’s difficulty: sprinting too early in the race and poor grip wax. At least that’s what the Canadians think…their chief coach justin wadsworth said that the 1st the preem ended petter‘s race. it was too close to the start and too hard, so he instructed his guys to avoid it…also, kershaw noticed that northug did not seem to have the grip running on the outside of the track.

Tomorrow anything can happen in theory, but I see a Legkov vs Cologna duel. And we might finally see how fast Dario is up the final climb.

Today’s climb may bring some surprises. I doubt bauer will keep up with his record on the climb but one of the canadians (babikov!?) may do very well…I also think hellner can deliver a special performance today. as I analyzed a couple of days ago, northug without a comfortable cushion of bonuses was unlikely to win the gc…and so it look to happen.

the topography of the climb (flat for 6.5km out of the total 9km) and the strength of numbers in terms of team tactic/drafting/standings, favor one of the Russians today. i agree, legkov is the most logical choice having shown a consistent climbing strength during the past 2 days (1st to the top in the 5km classic and lively yesterday in the intermidiate sprints).

cologna ? if I recall correctly, lost to legkov almost 1.5 minute last year on the very mountain. so his chances seem to line up with 2nd on the GC.

we shall see in 2 hours

 

[Libertine Seguros]

Johaug's really going hell for leather for this one, but she's got too much to do. Looks like Steira went deep yesterday, and looks like she needs to worry more about Kalla, Lahteenmäki and Jacobsen than about Johaug now. Then again, it looks like Johaug's suffering.

 

[meat puppet]

Yes, gotta give it to Johaug. Surely digging deep.

I'll wager Kalla drops Lähteenmäki and Jacobsen.

 

[maltiv]

Yes, gotta give it to Johaug. Surely digging deep.

I'll wager Kalla drops Lähteenmäki and Jacobsen.

I think Weng will pass them, she's normally almost as good a climber as Johaug.

 

[meat puppet]

What do you know, wrong as usual.

 

[Libertine Seguros]

Looks like yesterday won it for Kowalczyk as we suspected, the bonuses plus the 40-odd seconds gained in real time proved crucial. Still resent that she got 15" for winning a pursuit she led off in though, felt those bonuses should have gone for the fastest times on the day, not the winner of the race. It wouldn't have changed the overall result, it wouldn't have been enough, but still.

 

[Libertine Seguros]

The poor Nordic Combined guys - I thought that the conditions were bad in Oberhof, they're even worse in Schonach - they've had a lot of rain and just keeping enough snow to hold the race has been a challenge, with very dirty snow and edges even inside the course markers struggling to be maintained. They've been doing some miraculous jobs in Germany in the last few days just to be able to hold races at all.

 

[maltiv]

Time for another Gössner show now

 

[maltiv]

Time for another Gössner show now

I think I jinxed it...5 misses on the first shooting!

 

[Libertine Seguros]

Oh, Miri

 

[Libertine Seguros]

Berger misses 4 in lane 1 at shooting 2!!!

Edit:

That was one of the strangest pursuits I ever saw, results going all over the place. Seems like there was a problem with lane 1 or something, since while Gößner is known for erratic shooting, Tora Berger is not, and her misses were in almost exactly the same places as Miri's. Leave it to Olga Zaitseva to make the cursed lane look like the stupid superstition it probably was, shooting 5/5 as if it was nothing to take the win. Nice to see Brunet going well after a poor season so far, but her pace is still lacking. Vitkova very good, and nice to see Valj Semerenko doing well after her injury woes and her sister getting most of the limelight for the last year and a half. Some insane amounts of misses out there, but it was very nice to see Kaisa Mäkäräinen shooting comparatively accurately and still skiing fast because she could inject another direction into the World Cup overall, she's been, on average, pretty much Gößner's pace thus far this season but shooting worse and having bad days at inopportune times.

Still incredible that after 10 penalty loops Miri can still make the top 10, but that was the kind of day that could really dent her occasionally frail confidence.

 

[jens_attacks]

ok now let's enjoy a third in a row for poltoranin!

 

[Libertine Seguros]

Sadly he didn't have enough in him to do so, even slipping out of the top 10 to my disappointment. Great race today from Legkov to take the win.

 

[Libertine Seguros]

What IS going on with Germany today? Peiffer joins the 0/5 club in the first standing, while Dimitry Malyshko pointedly puts any thought of a problem with lane 1 to bed - it must just be that, unlikely as it seems, both Gößner and Berger had almost identical disasters at the range.

 

[jens_attacks]

Sadly he didn't have enough in him to do so, even slipping out of the top 10 to my disappointment. Great race today from Legkov to take the win.

the climb killed him. well at least he gave me hope, starting full gas(which probably was also a mistake)
anyway the strongest won. sochi 2014 will be something to watch.

 

[meat puppet]

Well, Legkov did what he was going to do. Good thing that he had the balls to attack early on. Very solid performance and I'm glad for him. He seemed to fade a bit in the end tho, since Cologna gained something back. Or is it just that Legkov is a bit of a diesel whilst Cologna has a decent kick?

Who was the fastest up the climb BTW, Hellner or Babikov? Too bad Hellner did not catch Northug in the end, came darned close.

 

[jsem94]

Hellner was the fastest. Just as with Johaug, it would've been great to see them a bit further up before the final stage. Legkov's performance was awesome too.

About the biathlon today, how good was not Malyshko... and how can Miri miss 10/20 shots, and Berger 4/5 in one of the prone shootings.. insane.

 

[Libertine Seguros]

Hellner was the fastest. Just as with Johaug, it would've been great to see them a bit further up before the final stage. Legkov's performance was awesome too.

About the biathlon today, how good was not Malyshko... and how can Miri miss 10/20 shots, and Berger 4/5 in one of the prone shootings.. insane.

Miri missed 5/5 in the first prone in lane 1, then Berger missed 4/5 in lane 1. Take the 5 out of it and really, 2+1+2 at the last three shoots can't really be considered anything out of the ordinary for her. It's possible to write off the 5 as being a complete disaster borne out of pressure in front of her home audience, as conditions weren't bad at all and Team Germany actually zeroed in lane 1 too, and we know that she can cave under pressure, with situations like Pokljuka 2010 in mind. She's not normally known for good shooting anyhow. Tora Berger, on the other hand, is; and for her to then step into the same lane a few minutes later and miss 4 is therefore very uncharacteristic, especially given that her misses were going in the exact same places as Miri's, which raised the possibility that there was an alignment issue.

Nevertheless it seemed only to be an issue in prone as Henkel missed 2 and Zaitseva's shots were dead on centre in standing, so maybe it was just an incredible and shocking coincidence. If there was an issue, then clearly it was resolved before the men's race, because Malyshko certainly had no problems whatsoever.

Here's a question though: when was the last time a competitor missed 10 shots and still made it into the top 10 in any form of competition?

 

[jsem94]

No clue. Has it ever even happened? Miri won a pursuit with five misses too, had that ever been done previously?

 

[Libertine Seguros]

Well, obviously it (hitting the top 10 despite 10 misses) happened today but I don't know if it's something that's happened before.

Thanks to biathlonews, however, I do know that winning a pursuit with five misses had been done four times before. Uschi Disl was the first to manage it, and did it twice, in fact. Liv Grete Poirée and Katrin Apel both also managed it, while even beyond these Galina Koukleva, back in 1997, managed to win a pursuit with 6 misses. None of these won ahead of somebody who shot clear like Gößner did, however - with both of Disl's wins others missed 5 too. The nearest to that Pokljuka pursuit was Poirée, who missed 5 en route to winning a pursuit ahead of Corinne Niogret, after the Frenchwoman hit 19/20. That race was also at Pokljuka.

 

[jsem94]

Fun facts.

 

[python]

here are my 'fun facts' - the best pure climbers yesterday as we, cycling fans, often seek analogies to 2-wheel athletes.

below are the official climbing times between the climb start (km 6.3) and the finish (km 9.0). Added were body weights of the skiers where i could find it.

they tell us quite a lot...

that northug isn't even in the 20...that despite his 80+kg he managed to hang on with the guys 10 kg lighter (a testament to his huge engine)...that hellner is probably an aerobic monster with the best watt/kilo...that winning the tour the ski is probably not within northug's current athletic build as long as alpe cermis is on the manu.

...THAT, or northug will have to lose several kilos and risk losing his explosive power that made him the greatest contemporary winner.

1. 16:57 Marcus HELLNER (75kg)
2. 17:10 +00:13 Johannes DUERR (??)
3. 17:14 +00:17 Alexander LEGKOV (73kg))
4. 17:16 +00:20 Roland CLARA (65kg)
5. 17:16 +00:20 Ivan BABIKOV (68kg)
6. 17:25 +00:29 Lukas BAUER (70kg)
7. 17:26 +00:29 Thomas MORIGGL (65kg)
8. 17:28 +00:31 Giorgio DI CENTA (67kg)
9. 17:30 +00:34 Johan OLSSON (68kg)
10. 17:33 +00:36 Dario COLOGNA (75kg)
11. 17:54 +00:57 Maxim VYLEGZHANIN (68kg)
12. 17:55 +00:58 Robin DUVILLARD (68kg)
.................
21. 18:20 +01:23 Petter jr. NORTHUG (82kg)

 

[jsem94]

That's a great list. Not surprising to see Hellner on top, he has a powerful engine and is not in contention this year because of his downfall in the classic style. Clara is a light skier with great capacity, has always done well on this stage.

Olsson had never done this climb before, but he handled it brilliantly. It's a shame he has such a fragile body and bronchi, he's easily one of the most talented active skiers.

 

[Tyler'sTwin]

here are my 'fun facts' - the best pure climbers yesterday as we, cycling fans, often seek analogies to 2-wheel athletes.

below are the official climbing times between the climb start (km 6.3) and the finish (km 9.0). Added were body weights of the skiers where i could find it.

they tell us quite a lot...

that northug isn't even in the 20...that despite his 80+kg he managed to hang on with the guys 10 kg lighter (a testament to his huge engine)...that hellner is probably an aerobic monster with the best watt/kilo...that winning the tour the ski is probably not within northug's current athletic build as long as alpe cermis is on the manu.

...THAT, or northug will have to lose several kilos and risk losing his explosive power that made him the greatest contemporary winner.

1. 16:57 Marcus HELLNER (75kg)
2. 17:10 +00:13 Johannes DUERR (??)
3. 17:14 +00:17 Alexander LEGKOV (73kg))
4. 17:16 +00:20 Roland CLARA (65kg)
5. 17:16 +00:20 Ivan BABIKOV (68kg)
6. 17:25 +00:29 Lukas BAUER (70kg)
7. 17:26 +00:29 Thomas MORIGGL (65kg)
8. 17:28 +00:31 Giorgio DI CENTA (67kg)
9. 17:30 +00:34 Johan OLSSON (68kg)
10. 17:33 +00:36 Dario COLOGNA (75kg)
11. 17:54 +00:57 Maxim VYLEGZHANIN (68kg)
12. 17:55 +00:58 Robin DUVILLARD (68kg)
.................
21. 18:20 +01:23 Petter jr. NORTHUG (82kg)

Gotta question those numbers. I doubt most of these guys are built like GT-riders. They sure don't look like it.